Cool. iMessage team needs to add some of these features tbh

I had an uncontrollable smile when I saw (and heard) the *high five* function. Have told my fiancée to download this and will try it out with her. Nice design, team!

The biggest problem with messaging apps like these on iOS vs. Android is that they can't interact with the default messaging layer. I absolutely love the flexibility of 3rd party messaging apps when I use Android devices, but when I use iOS, I never stray from iMessage and Messenger (simply because i get Facebook messages and I can't see them in-app anymore), because diluting my contact pool over multiple apps is a frustrating experience in fragmentation. It's hard to maintain and makes communication clunky. I understand that certain messaging apps are needed and have viable functionality, such as security or group offerings. But apps like these on iOS always have limited shelf life and appeal because they can't get natural mass adoption due to the iMessage walled garden. Great looking product, guys, but on iOS you have a nearly impossible task of lasting conversion to make.

Great team & great product. @johnnychengx is an incredible founder and I can't wait to see where this platform is going in the future. All the best 🎉🎉🎉

Cool name! :)

We don't have a messenger problem, we have a value adding and identity problem...I don't see this making any big waves long term...I mean if we're talking about getting 1 million users that join today and leave tomorrow sure, every single messenger has done this. But solving a real issue for real people, especially a new generation that is proposing more decentralized access to their information, demanding transparency, demanding respected by the likes of Facebook when it comes to their privacy, and what that means to them, and their affordance and accessibility. I just don't get it...in a world crying out for problems to be solved, especially with transformative technology globally, to reimagine so much for the next billion people coming online. I just don't see this being part of the solution. People never wanted Facebook or Friendster or Myspace, they wanted value...an identify protocol for connecting and engaging when moving in and out of environments online, allowing them to communicate expressively regardless of the traditional constraints found in other mediums. The offerings that went above and beyond to establish a unified and ubiquitous value adding brand won in a big way and their was only one that did this right. Above all because they were actually defining "identity" not social behavior. Your identify protocol, which is something we are now in the midst of redefining thanks to Facebook. Everyday people hate bots they will never want bots they will never want a buzzword masquerading as a solution , what they want and will always demand even 300 years from now is value....that can be expressed with offerings working more intelligently in the way they were always meant to work, in harmony with culture, design that understands context and conditions and design that isn't just how it looks but how it works. Anonymous applications....identity for a new generation has to also be defined...you can see the terrible torment that even that having no real design theories in our marketplace or guidelines is reaching havoc on this world, people are dying, kids are being bullied, bomb threats after bomb threats...but yet we keep copy and pasting the same stuff and saying oh well who cares why we sit in our mansions and collect billions, by sucking value out of the world, we need to ask ourselves just because we can doesn't mean we should, lets ask them, the people we keep saying we serve what identity, privacy means to them. Treat people the way they want to be treated, not the way you want to be treated....because to do that, you have to ask them first....this never gets done no one ever bends down and instead of only caring about validating a pre conceived perception, gets these very people we say we are here to serve involved in the implementation. People have an energy problem, as humans we need energy to pay our taxes, make decisions, download apps, and experience the world around us. This app has complexity on top of complexity. We forget that people have to always fire someone else and hire you for the same job, and that doesn't mean they fire Facebook that could be they have to also fire their own perception of how this should work, if you aren't aligned in doing that better sticker packs won't keep your retention above the industry standard. best of luck but I would stress more than anything here as you build this ask the hard questions don't carbon copy interactions, expressions of yesterdays solutions to patch todays problems for a today generation, this will skip learning and it doesn't solve any real issues....doesn't allow you to think with a better perspective of the challenges of the people today and what they want out of life.

Curious as to why the video is so dramatic?

Weird choice to show someone driving and texting at the end of the video... granted it's kinda hidden :D

@johnnychengx looks great, but I cant find it in the Italian App Store, any reason for a limited release?

Lots of thinking out of the box. Love where your heads at.

I like this. A lot. We are seeing lots of bots as 'add-ons' to current messaging platforms, facebook, slack, kik etc - but Amity has 'add-ons' baked into the messaging app from day 1 (today!). There are some useful AND playful things you can do inside the messenger. Reminds me of the iOS 10 iMessage Demo. But with any product competing in the messaging space, it's going to be tough and there is the chicken and egg problem. I like the social network feel to it but more closed than something like Facebook. How are you planning on getting people to use Amity as their go-to messaging platform? Is this designed specifically for a certain market? And what are your favourite things you can do in Amity that you cannot do on other messaging apps very well? P.S. I'm bentossell on Amity 😛

This is super cool, love the multimedia channels of expression. Best of luck!

Looks intriguing so just got my wife to download it, after doing that myself. Let's see how it goes. Good luck and kudos for the effort.

Cool, but I prefer Dauntless

This is a very well thought out app with world class design and features. Would say it's on par with messenger, if not a better experience. The only difference being the 1bn of so users messenger already has. Good luck guys, awesome work.

Congratulations @johnnychengx, you and the team have worked hard and sacrificed much to get to here. There are many great ideas in the product and I love that a first-time Aussie team has launched such a polished product at 1.0. Here's what I don't love, minor and major, all regarding the onboarding flow. Minor: don't require them to choose a password in the onboarding process, you're almost guaranteeing lost, forgotten and insufficiently secure passwords. Unsophisticated users only have to be confused/frustrated with a recover/reset password process one time to decide they don't want to use your product anymore. And you don't want anybody dictionary-hacking your passwords, which is much more likely if you're asking people to choose a password unexpectedly, reluctant to switch apps to record the password for fear of losing the onboarding flow, and unlikely to remember the password they've chosen for long enough to record it after their first use of the app. Minor: no demo of unique features? Really? Major: don't slow onboarding by asking for all the account setup info before the user's allowed to play with the features. You're overestimating your new user's level of investment in your product. That's very typical when you've spent years thinking about and working on nothing else! But remember that in order for your product to succeed, the majority of new users will have .001% commitment to trying the product because they've been messaged an invite by someone they can also reach via other messaging apps, or clicked on a social media mention, or been served an install ad. Verify their mobile number, have them choose a username and get them straight into using the coolest features in your product. If anything's going to drive engagement for you, it's your unique features that other messenger apps don't have. Most new users *won't* be engaged enough with Amity on their first use to find those features themselves. Major: still way too hard to find/invite friends. Most new users won't fight their way through these many different options (abundant choice creates indecision and postponement) so recommend the best approach for most users. And none of the choices made it easy enough for me, for instance, to find you! I only have your email address not your mobile and the user name search wasn't fuzzy enough to give me any results at all despite trying several permutations of your first and surname.

Great looking product. Tough space for sure but always some room for innovation. Love the "more live" features like actionable emojis. Getting critical mass to switch is going to be the challenge and searching for some niche groups / specific markets to start might be effective.

Really glad to see something innovative in the fierce competitive space of messaging. I am trying the app now, and looks great so far in terms of design. I am especially looking forward to the new features :) If you want to connect I am irina there

@johnnychengx Looks really cool. Exactly what I think iMessage 10 and Allo is aiming for. Do you support GIFs, because if you do I think we should talk.

Haven't tried the product yet but the design looks seriously on point. My fear is this will become little more than a design concept for Messenger where the coolest features will be copied.. I mean.. "inspired by" :/ I think it would take a massive 10x experience to migrate users and this feels more like 1.2x which nonetheless should be applauded. Good luck team and I will definitely follow your progress